


Percentages

by Ladycat



Category: House M.D., Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, M/M, on Earth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-12
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-12 03:00:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John meets House's startling blue eyes. "This isn't my first combat situation," he says, and lets House make of that what he will. He's pretty sure House will get it right, though; he's that kind of guy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Percentages

"I miss Carson."

The words aren't as glum as they probably should have been. John looks up from the newspaper he hasn't really been reading, one eyebrow raised. "Um?"

Once, when he found several of his men ranking the various officers they had to serve under, he discovered he was listed as the worst officer at dealing with anything resembling being comforting or personal entanglements. This included offering praise. Strangely, they didn't mean it as an insult.

John didn't take it as one either.

Lost in a sea of white and drooping, cascading wires, Rodney studies the way his thumb curves in. "Don't make me say it again," he says, peevishly.

"I kinda thought you'd like this doctor. He's, uh."

"No, that's _you_ who likes this doctor, since the more laconic and unmoved you are, the nastier he is. Don't think I haven't figured out where you got that trick from, either.

John tilts his head, deciding that yeah, that's probably about right. "There's something about opposites attracting..."

"Oh, ha. Ha. My sides are splitting." Rodney glares as direly as he can, which makes John insides clench. He looks... weak, skin papery and pale with only a few splotches of color from freckles, eyes almost gray with lack of pigment. He looks like he's going to phase right out of reality, like the old Star Trek transporters, going translucent right before John's eyes.

Dropping the paper, John ignores every rule the earnest red-headed doctor had given him, sympathy rich and cloying in every word, and sits down on the edge of Rodney's bed, taking one of his hands into both of John's. The skin is cold enough to make him shiver, but he doesn't; just gently rubs until he can feel a little spark of warmth.

It may just be his own body-heat, referred. He doesn't care.

"You mentioned Carson?"

"If it was Carson, the answers would be easy. They'd still be horrible, of course, and probably just as deadly, but it would be... it would be something _else_."

Something other-worldly. Something that came from new life and new civilizations. Something that wasn't as mundane and normal as -- as whatever this was.

"Hate to break it to you, McKay, but this isn't all that normal. I've done some checking on House." Lots of checking, including calling in some of his few remaining favors with regular Air Force buddies to get as much dirt as possible on the guy, and any potential strings he could pull. "He takes the weirdest, most unusual cases. So yeah, it's not... job-related. Doesn't make you normal." Thoughtfully, he taps his chin. "Come to think of it, not sure anything could make you normal."

Rodney's face writhes like he wants to say _Ha, ha, oh, very funny, Colonel_ , but all that comes out is a wheeze. John snatches up the oxygen, fitting the plastic over Rodney's mouth and nose with practiced ease -- hates it, he _hates_ it, hates that he's so good at this -- and waits until Rodney collapses back to his pillow, only a few shades darker than that pristine, pure snow white.

"Don't you dare leave me behind," John whispers. "Don't you dare."

Rodney's hearing isn't what it used to be, but a whisper three feet away is still within range. His eyes open, fluttering painfully. "That's your idiotic creed, not mine, Sheppard."

"Yeah, right."

The room reeks of antiseptic and sweat, stale humans who've been there too long, but John doesn't move. _He_ can't leave Rodney behind, barely able to stumble out into the brighter hallways, cleaning up in bathrooms only when the red-head forces him, eating what the blond doctor with the too-pretty mouth surreptitiously brings him. John suspects there's a hint of solidarity going there, but doesn't comment on it.

So far, no one's outright commented on why John has power of attorney over Rodney, but he suspects those questions are coming. Not from House; those too-similar blue eyes had him pegged and categorized the moment he'd barged his way into the hospital room, waving the legal document like the P-90 he desperately wishes he could use.

"When's Teyla coming?"

"What, I'm not good enough for you anymore?"

"Yes, that's right. I'm bored of your face and wish for a change of scenery." Rodney's too tired to smile, but he makes an attempt. "I just -- I could use a bath. And I don't want those harpies touching me again."

Ah, yes. Rodney's constant, never-ending battle with nurses. Doesn't matter which galaxy they're in, if there's a nurse to glare disapprovingly, Rodney will find a way to antagonize her. Or him -- even the male nurses won't go near Rodney unless they absolutely have to.

Fortunately, what Rodney's after is easy enough for John to arrange. "Hang on," he says and slips out of the room. A short conversation with the nurse who thinks he's cute -- something John uses shamelessly, and has used long before he ever needed to deflect Rodney's abrasive behavior -- and he manages to convince her to turn over the goods.

Weighted down by a whole lot more than a big, sexy sponge, John re-enters the room to see Rodney scowling at the doorway as much as he can. "Where did you go! You just vanished, poof, like you'd been snatched by an -- "

"Language, Rodney." He' doesn't say 'classified'. That just makes people more curious. "You said you wanted a bath, right? Just getting what we need."

" _We_ need? Does this mean you're finally going to go shower? You stink, Sheppard. You stink like you've been running with Ronon."

"Aw, such flattery." He wonders, sometimes, if others hear the worry underneath the frustrated bluntness that's so trademark Rodney. House does. The black doctor -- Foreman? -- does too, to a degree. The other two don't, but then, John doesn't expect it of them. "You say the nicest things to me, McKay."

And then sometimes Rodney's too tired to play. "You need to shower. And eat. And sleep in a bed. A _real_ bed." Rodney heaves a sigh that rattles, eying him balefully. "Sheppard."

He ignores it. He has too. Fortunately, he's got a distraction already prepared. It might've been cumbersome to carry, but John discovers that the equipment he's been given is simple enough to understand. He closes the blinds while the bucket fills, adding soap gradually. They use a special antibacterial soap, probably more expensive, but anything less makes Rodney break out in hives. They've been through this too many times for John to tease him about being a princess: he isn't. It's his body that's demanding attention, this time.

Getting the soft cloth good and soapy, John flicks Rodney’s hospital gown open and runs it down his torso. He's still barrel-chested, thankfully, his shoulders just as broad and powerful. That's the problem, actually -- there's no reason for him to be this exhausted, this bloodless, since his muscles are still as strong and vibrant as ever. He just... can't move them. Much.

Rodney groans as the cloth brushes against a stomach that's a lot more taut than it used to be. "Oh, god. John..."

"Shhh." The tubes and wires are complicated, but John paid carefully attention as they were each inserted, reading the schematic as quickly as Rodney or Zelenka might, and he gets Rodney's gown pushed down around his hips in moments.

He uses broad strokes, up over Rodney's sternum to trace along his collarbones, the rounded swell of his shoulders and down arms that aren't quite as thick and heavy as before, but at least not much thinner. He swipes over each finger, palm, the inside of wrist and elbow before sliding back up to travel down the other side.

"Mm," Rodney says, shivering when John comes too close to an old scar -- it's ticklish, he knows, there's no pain involved. "That feels really good."

There's something almost mindless, hypnotic about what he's doing. Dip the cloth in the water, wring it out, then sweep back and forth over Rodney's body, watching for any signs of discomfort. The watchfulness is something John can never turn off, not completely, which is why he isn't surprised when -- idly contemplating how to get the rest of the gown off when Rodney is as close to relaxed and blissed-out as he's been in days -- he hears a voice say, "Aw, and I forgot my camera."

"Pretty sure there's hotter gay clips out there, if you're looking."

"Been doing a lot of one-handed searching?"

John gives his most yes-sir-of-course-sir grin over his shoulder. House actually laughs.

"Any change?"

John will never tell Rodney this, but lightning changes in conversation isn't something he learned in Rodney's labs. He learned it in boot-camp. "No. You were wrong. Again"

"There aren't many people who have the temerity to say something like that to me."

John meets House's startling blue eyes. "This isn't my first combat situation," he says, and lets House make of that what he will. He's pretty sure House will get it right, though; he's that kind of guy.

House ambles over to the flickering computer-screen and all its meaningless numbers and graphs and pokes at it listlessly. John resumes cleaning Rodney up, carefully blotting out a line of sweat before it ever approaches the bushy tufts of his eyebrows.

"You should teach me that trick," House says.

"Which one?"

"The one where you scared Cameron so badly she doesn't want to come back in here without one of the bigger, and possibly male, nurses. I didn't think anything could rub the feminist off her."

John smirks, moving the cloth in an s-pattern down Rodney's neck, avoiding the one mole that Rodney hates when others touch. "Didn't do anything." He just looked at her. Hard. And thought about Rodney, pale and weak and _dying_ on the bed in the room she was trying to bar him from.

Not his fault if he looked kinda angry about it. It's _Rodney._

"Mm. I guess it's an Army trick, then."

The instinct is to protest 'Air Force', but what actually comes out is, "SGC."

Which isn't right either. But he can't say Atlantis, not when they're effectively barred until Rodney is well again. And he will be -- John's made a few _other_ calls and he's got a stand-by arrangement if things get too bad, too fast. It's a last-ditch effort, though, and even Sam thinks House is a better choice.

"Don't think I've ever heard of that branch of the military."

Screw House being there. Rodney's asleep -- or at least not fully conscious -- and John hasn't had modesty since before Basic. He gently pats Rodney dry with a spare blanket, then covers his torso and hips, pushing the other blankets haphazardly onto the floor. Rodney's toes are big and hairy. John calls them Hobbit toes, just to make Rodney crazy -- Rodney hates Lord of the Rings, and gets infuriated when people are surprised by that.

"We're going to try something else. Something you probably won't like."

"What are the percentages?" He doesn't demand not to be removed from Rodney's bedside. That, at least, is taken care of: a short conversation with Cuddy and a laughably pathetic showing from the local security pool had convinced her that the only way John was leaving was over a pile of dead bodies.

He never gets in the way, though. Too many _back up, Sheppard, your hair is blocking the light!_ ringing in his ears.

"You don't want to hear the percentages."

John compresses his lips together. The cloth dangles from his fingers, limp against the ball of Rodney's calf. "Do you know what we do?"

"Listen to a lot of YMCA? Maybe try on women's shoes?"

That breaks John's train of thought; he has to smile. "You're just like him. You save lives just like him."

House blinks. "He saves lives?"

"He says things like there's only a three percent chance whatever spit-ball fix he's dreamed up will take, and a 97 percent chance we'll all die horribly. But he's always in that three. So yeah, Doctor House." He stresses the _doctor_ the way he never does for Rodney, who wouldn't take him seriously anyway. "Give me the percentages."

House is a tall man, craggy and touched with shadows that grow thicker and more menacing in the dim light of Rodney's room. "Five percent. Maybe six."

John's learned how to beat odds worse than that. He hopes Rodney has, too. "Side effects?"

"No idea. It's experimental at best, based on research that's about as well put together as your scientist's 'spit-ball fixes'."

"But you think it'll work." John's glad Rodney's not awake to hear himself called 'John's scientist'. It'd make him froth at the mouth, exhaustion or no exhaustion.

"If it doesn't, he'll die faster."

"He's dying now." John doesn't need the knowledge he's picked up from being in too many infirmaries to know that. He can see it in Rodney's eyes, duller and duller by the hour.

"He'll die faster."

John's always cared about people watching. Not for the things people normally care about, like his body on display. That's different, because it's not _him_. A part, yes, but it's not the one that he’s built up through years of work, kept private from everyone except those he chose to let in. Everyone sees his body.

Only a very few see him.

John kisses Rodney's knees, back stooped and aching, eyes painfully dry. "When will you get the drug?"

"An hour."

"He'll be okay that long?"

"Is there a choice?"

There is, actually, but John's promised to wait until the very last moment. He'll abide by that promise because Rodney's life is too precious for any kind of betrayal. "Go away."

"Sorry, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t Fort Princeton, and even if it was, _I’d_ \-- "

“Get out.” John pulls himself up straight. He doesn't bark. He doesn't order. He doesn't know what he does, but it's the same voice that makes Lorne go white around the eyes, his men suddenly frantic to do _exactly_ what they're told.

House gets. He looks bemused, but he still gets. Whatever, John thinks. He'll get over being ordered about the same way John did. The same way Rodney does.

The same way Rodney _will_.

There's not a whole lot of room at the edge of Rodney's bed, but John's a skinny guy and his balance is a lot better than it used to be. "Hey. Rodney."

A few more moments of gentle prodding and Rodney blinks back into awareness. It kills John to do this -- Rodney needs to sleep desperately -- but if there's only an hour, then John's going to be selfish. 

"Hm?"

"C'mon, McKay, wake up for me. All the way -- there you go."

"You remember I vetoed the dog idea, right?" There should be whip-cracking ire in that voice, not sandpapery exhaustion. "Don't think I'm going to tolerate any weird transference."

The only reason the dog got vetoed is that the SGC put its foot down when Rodney tried to sneak one through.

John's not supposed to know that.

Tucking his head between Rodney's neck shoulder and chin, John lets his hand burrow underneath the blankets to find Rodney's bare stomach, and then a little lower. "You fell asleep during your sponge-bath."

For the first time in over a week, a hint of blue bleeds through gray. "What? Are you -- Did someone slip you some of the drugs meant for me? Because that's -- ahh."

John thumbs over the head again, circling out towards the edge of the crown: Rodney loves that. "Well, you know we live to be clichés."

Chest heaving, Rodney licks cracked, chapped lips. "John -- "

"Just let me, okay? Please."

Without waiting for a response, John pushes everything he can to one side and shimmies down so he's lying over Rodney's legs. It's not comfortable. Rodney's knees are poking into some fairly sensitive places, and nobody's legs are comfortable to lie on during the best of times.

John welcomes each and every second of discomfort because that's _Rodney_ all over.

He kisses around the base of Rodney's cock, blowing lightly over the damp skin, before spiraling those kisses up towards the tip again.

"John -- really." Rodney's hand shakes as it burrows into John's hair, a painful knock on John's already bruised heart -- Rodney's hand _always_ does this during a blow-job. It's just that normally the shaking is from excitement, not illness. "What are you doing?"

"You telling me you don't want this?" He kisses again, tongue dipping into the slit. "I promised you a sponge bath, which means I get to clean up _every_ part of you."

Rodney’s head lifts off the blanket to stare down the length of his own body. "I -- I'm hard?" It's definitely a question.

John ovals his mouth to take the head inside, sucking as sweetly as he knows how, before opening back up with a pop. "Yup. Don't say no, Rodney."

"I never do, you know."

For that, John takes the whole cock inside of him, sucking greedily as he bobs up and down. Rodney's cock has never been very veiny, but John can feel each of them now, unexpected lines of hardness when he's used to tasting only smooth, sweet velvet. 

He uses every trick he's ever learned: light kisses when Rodney's fully hard, probably using up all the blood he needs so desperately for other things, but John doesn't care. He _wants_ this, wants Rodney red and leaking, curving up towards his belly while John nuzzles against the base, sucking on his balls, one, then the other, because Rodney likes multiple types of stimulation. He nearly sprains his tongue as he slides Rodney's cock back into his mouth, doing things he never does _because_ of the potential tongue-spraining, giving Rodney as much pleasure as he can.

Above him, Rodney gasps, too weak to arch but trembling with the need. His fingers are blunt and too loose in John's hair, but he's trying to grab, trying to pull John back up from the surprisingly sensitive skin along his inner thigh and back towards his cock, greedy and demanding as always. Normally, John fights him, staying away from Rodney’s cock as long as he can stand it. This time, he goes. He has to, because Rodney's cock is _there_ , a faint pink and slick from John's mouth, begging to be tasted again.

"J-John," Rodney whimpers, breathing harshly enough that almost John goes for the oxygen, giving in to the habit that's become need. He stops himself, though. Not yet. "John, oh _god."_

Time. John dives back onto Rodney's cock, abandoning all the fancy tricks for the oldest one in the book: suction, hard and constant as he takes as much as he can, his hand sliding over the rest. He's _taking_ now, while Rodney shudders and twists as much as he's able, truly gasping as his body gives in to the only proof John has ever needed.

He tastes the same: salty and bitter and Rodney.

John stays with his face pressed to Rodney's thigh, clutching Rodney’s hips. The world is softer, here. Safer. No one can see him with his eyes closed, safe in the familiar comfort of Rodney's skin.

Eventually he gets up and fits the oxygen mask over Rodney's mouth and nose. Rodney doesn't say anything, although the sliver of blue in his eyes means he desperately wants to.

Or maybe not. John doesn't think that's just sweat-lines down the sides of Rodney's face. He probably has similar ones.

He's only just set Rodney fully to rights when the door slides open. The whole team troops in, all of them wearing their Bad News faces. John has to grin -- painful and thin, but still amused -- because he's seen those faces on a hundred doctors, in a hundred situations.

Only House returns the smile, his eyes lingering on John's mouth and the probably hectic flush on his cheeks. John's grin gets bigger.

"There's probably some pun that's appropriate here, but I think I'll refrain."

"Really? Why would you do that?" Rodney shifts so his shoulder is more solidly under John's hand. "And you couldn't have waited ten more minutes? There was something I wanted to do."

"Just let me get my webcam."

Understanding blooms and John, Rodney, and House are treated to the sight of three adults squirming like children, all wanting to say ewwww.

"What, did you _miss_ that?" House snaps at his people. "The smell alone should've -- "

"House!" The red-head has her mouth pursed in prim disapproval, but when she turns towards the bed, her eyes are dancing. "Sorry. We can probably come back, if you want."

Now it's _their_ turn to blush. "You're early."

The blond one blinks. "Your time sense is amazing," he says, after checking the clock.

"Not surprising since he’s military. Both of them are." Foreman -- is that his name? -- paces forward to level a dry look at Rodney. "Are you going to fight us again?"

John tilts Rodney's face back towards his and kisses him. It's not the quick pecks they've been stealing over the past week and half. This is a kiss, mouths open, tongues touching, and as wet and dirty as Rodney can participate in. "Don't argue, Rodney."

"It's my body."

"Got a piece of paper that says it's mine."

Rodney swallows, darting a look back towards their audience. He hides as much as John, if in different ways. "I'm going to kill Elizabeth."

John's laughter is sudden and fractured, rougher from its unexpectedness. _He'd_ meant the power of attorney that Elizabeth had created for them years ago. Rodney is talking about something else entirely. "I'll bring popcorn."

"You better. The good stuff, too, not that microwave crap."

"That means yes," John says without straightening. The position is hell on his back, but he doesn't care.

"I hate it when you talk for me."

"No you don't."

"Okay! As entertaining as this particular tennis match is, we need you two lovebirds to disengage so we can start saving your life." House plows forward, wielding his cane the same way Rodney normally wields those powerful arms and dangerously sharpened words.

John doesn't actually leave, just flattens himself against the wall, hand on Rodney's neck. He looks directly at House and asks, "Am I out of your way?"

Across the room, Cameron flinches.

"Yeah," House says. "You're fine." He loops a new bag onto the IV tree, threading it into the line connected to Rodney's arm. "Everybody hold on."


End file.
